Two Days Before
by St-Jimmy1669
Summary: Every time, Wilson tells himself that there's no coming back. Every time, he's proved wrong. But there has to be a tipping point.


Cuddy having finally left them in peace, Wilson settled himself at the end of the bed. The room was sparsely-furnished by the hospital's standards: just the requisite bed and tray, and a chair in the corner by the glass wall. If he'd felt like it, Wilson could have dragged the chair over to his position, but that wasn't on his list of priorities currently. As much as his back ached and his head throbbed, it was all he could do to turn away from House for the short instants in which he had to deal with the nurses who popped in from time to time.

He still hadn't regained consciousness: it had been over 48 hours. When the ambulance team had brought him in, they hadn't considered it a particularly serious incident – not unlike the time he'd stuck a penknife in the plug socket in his office. But House had been in one of these beds... well, Wilson didn't want to think how many times, and he'd always bounced back. This time... it had taken longer for him to be found, so perhaps it was expected. But... oh, he had no idea. All of those years of medical training and remaining calm under pressure went out the window where House was concerned, and Wilson was reduced to feeling as useless as the various relatives of his own patients.

If he took the time to think about it, 48 hours wasn't long – he had been out for longer after the seizure, after – no, it didn't bear thinking about. Nothing bore thinking about right now. Though leaning on the end of the bed, watching every flicker of the eyelid and twitch of the hand desperately for signs of life, what else could he do? And each time he hauled his mind to the present, it would slip back even more easily into his memories. Though he had sort of come to face those with a benign indifference: there wasn't a lot he could do about them now, he supposed. They had to be better than wondering about the future, at any rate.

Thinking about what was going to happen was infinitely worse. When - if, increasingly if – House woke up, there would be those awkward moments of Wilson telling him just how much of a jerk he was and... He didn't know – he never knew – whether or not to tell him that he hated him. And that he loved him. And that – God, he had no idea what to feel, because it happened so often that those first moments of consciousness always followed exactly the same mechanical routine: House, you're an idiot. Yeah, what can you do about it? And they'd just carry on exactly the same as before, with House thinking God knows what, and Wilson thinking how he'd wash his hands of this whole thing if it happened again, daring to hope that House might have been changed somehow; might have realised that he didn't need to know what was out there; might have figured out just how screwed up it made Wilson feel. But then, it would just happen again, and Wilson would spend another day at the end of a hospital bed, waiting anxiously, and House would wake up and realise he didn't have any answers and that he might as well have not bothered to wake up at all. Because that was what Wilson did, and that was what House did, and it worked, or at least it came as close to working as it was ever likely to do.

And every time, there was that sneaking suspicion that the next time, there would be no coming back. House would do himself in for good.

Watching the lines weave themselves across the heart monitor in a ceaseless pattern, Wilson had to admit, though the very idea made his stomach churn, that perhaps it _was _thatnext time. Ridiculous, of course – he had battled that doubt every time so far, and would probably continue to do so. Still... this time, it was palpably different. Accounts were confused: no-one was quite sure what had happened. But the details weren't important. Usually, House pulled these sorts of self-destructive stunts in the hospital: bleeding out after getting shot, transfusing potentially dangerous blood, injecting nitro-glycerine, taking Alzheimer's medication, electrocuting himself... the list went on. Even when he'd been detoxing, the first time, he'd smashed his hand up in his own office. The actions were upsetting; even alarming, but at least he intended to get found out and he knew he was pretty much safe. There were isolated incidents, though, where Wilson suspected that House 

had never meant to get found out. Cutting himself and overdosing on Oxycodone... he had conducted both at his flat, and it was only chance that Cameron, and then Wilson himself, had turned up and witnessed it... Wilson refused to even reflect on what might have gone on without anybody knowing, because when he thought about House, alone, medicating on too many pills and too much alcohol, slicing open an artery, because he had nothing better to do... it actually frightened him.

And now this. All anybody knew – all anybody was going to know until the man himself came round – was that, when Cuddy had turned up, the front door was on the latch, and House was lying comatose on the bedroom floor with his fist frozen around the melted handle of a kitchen knife, the blade of which protruded from the wall socket. When Cuddy told Wilson to switch on his mobile so that they could communicate any news, he'd found seven missed calls from House's home line.

Wilson wasn't sure why Cuddy had gone there – and, to be honest, he really didn't care, because all that mattered was that, if she hadn't gone, House would have been there still when Wilson turned up the next morning (the motorbike was being serviced) and by then, it would have been too late...

The very words sent an icy finger up Wilson's spine. He could quite easily have found House – perhaps – and this was only his sleep-deprived brain concocting wild fantasies, he hoped – perhaps House had intended Wilson to find him. Perhaps he had intended to... to... he couldn't even bring himself to think it. But then, if he had, why the phone calls? God...

Wilson couldn't bear it: he backed into the chair, collapsing onto it, not taking his eyes off House's perfectly still form all the time. If he had just had his damn phone on, there would have been no missed calls. He might have been sitting at home right now, with a film or something, and House would have been on his third or fourth whiskey and be... not happy, but at least content. And instead, all of this had to have happened, and the idiot might never wake up and – Christ, the man didn't even leave a message! What the hell was he meant to do, meant to say...?

Reminding himself that he was in House's hospital room – as though he needed reminding – Wilson looked back at the bed, and, with a start, met House's bleak stare.

Their eyes locked onto each other for an instant, before Wilson was on his feet, lurching across the short expanse of floor separating him from the bed. He went to grasp the older man's hand, but recoiled at the last moment, with a look at the stark burn trailing up his arm, and contented himself with grasping his shoulder roughly. He opened his mouth to speak, but every word, every syllable of remonstrance had evaporated, and he looked down, in a futile effort to disguise his suddenly-streaming eyes.

It was House who spoke first.

"I... tried to call." His voice was flat; cracking. Wilson shook his head, still unable to voice the tumultuous cascade of words that crashed about inside him. He looked back up, slowly. House was still watching him with that same unreadable stare, apparently waiting for a response. Again, he shook his head, and, letting go of House's shoulder, drew the chair across the room. What use were words going to be?

House tried again, his voice recovering some of its usual acidity.

"Well, this is familiar-"

That did it. Wilson broke in.

"Don't, House... just don't." The facetiousness was ill-placed; House should have realised that. "It's not... it's not a joke any more, OK? You're lucky you're even here."

"Lucky? Anyway... who came in?"

"Yes, House, lucky, whatever you might think." It was unlikely that House would want to discuss that element right now: he would be more interested in finding out exactly what happened. Which was good, because Wilson didn't trust himself to go into it. "And Cuddy went to your flat, at about two in the morning – don't ask me why – found you, and called the hospital straight away. You've been out for over two days."

"Why, what time is it now?"

"Four in the morning." Now he thought about it, and now he was sitting down, Wilson was agonisingly tired. But never mind that, for the moment. "Christ, what the Hell did you think you were doing? Another foray into the great beyond, or were you intending to off yourself for good this time?"

House didn't reply for a moment, but maintained that unwavering stare. Finally, he offered up a response.

"...I tried to call..."

"What's that supposed to mean? You didn't leave a message." Wilson really didn't want to think about it. Why had his phone been off? He'd been sitting in front of some documentary with his fifth beer... but he didn't want House to wonder about that.

"I..." House appeared at a loss, but that told Wilson all he needed to know. All the other times, House had been only too willing to discuss his motives. Somehow, he didn't think it was a good idea to try to guilt trip him out of it this time.

"OK." House looked relieved. "I should... I should let Cuddy know you're awake. The poor woman's been here almost as long as I have – she only left half an hour ago." Wilson waited for House's nod of confirmation before walking to the door, taking his phone out of his pocket. The conversation was a short one: as soon as Cuddy was reassured that there didn't seem to be any complications, she promised to be straight down. He told House this much as he resumed his seat.

"You'd better prepare yourself. I don't want answers right now, but she will."


End file.
